


Highschool Reunion

by brotherfuckers



Series: Striderclan [106]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Brotherly Support, Gen, High School, Hurt/Comfort, Trauma, mild violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-25
Updated: 2014-09-25
Packaged: 2018-02-18 19:18:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,857
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2359301
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brotherfuckers/pseuds/brotherfuckers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bro and D are somehow invited to their old high school reunion despite not ever graduating. It might be a good time to lay some ghosts to rest.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Highschool Reunion

**Author's Note:**

> Related to the work Highschool Sucks

Bro’s staring at the needles in his hand wondering when the one he was using became two. He shoves it into the nearest smuppet and rubs his eyes wearily. He’s just standing up to stretch out his back muscles when his phone goes off. It’s a nice distraction to the small details he was working on.

“Hello Momma.”

“Hello Derrick. You aren’t working yourself too hard are you?”

“No Momma, just takin’ a break when ya called.”

“Oh, what good timing.”

“Didja call ‘bout somethin’ specific? Not that I don’t enjoy just chattin’ with ya. How are the girls?”

“Yes, but the girls are fine. Miss you and the boys. You should come back up to New York more often.”

“Momma...”

“I’m not going to guilt you all into coming up. I know better. But that doesn’t mean I can’t hope. Especially when there are two embossed invitations for you and Richard in my hand.”

“Invitations?” Bro frowns as he leans up against the kitchen counter. “Ain’t no one got our New York address. Hell, not many have our Houston address. What’s somethin’ for a bunch of Striders doin’ up at your place?”

“Not Striders. Lalondes. Special invitation to Richard and Derrick Lalonde. Maybe Derrick Lalonde has better grammar,” she teases.

“This is gettin’ weirder and weirder. Who the heck would-”

“Courtesy of Derse Highschool for the twentieth reunion of the graduating class of ‘94,” she continued with a mirthful tone.

“There are so many things wrong with that statement.”

“I know. It’s fun.” Bro could hear that Mom was obviously enjoying herself as she gave him the information.

“One, we weren’t in the same class. Two, neither of us were in the class of ‘94. D would have been ‘96 and ‘98 for me. Which brings us to point three, neither of us graduated so I don’t think we’re actually invited to a class reunion. Four, who would actually want to invite us with how our exit went?”

“And yet, I hold the thick ivory cardstock, complete with calligraphic letters and embossing lined with gold leaf which detail the exact invitations to you and your brother.”

“This I gotta see. Could be one of your tricks to get us to come up there?”

“Pics or it didn’t happen? Derrick...”

“I didn’t mean it like that, Momma,” Bro says with exasperation.

“I know, I know. But how do you suppose I send you a copy?”

“Just take a picture with your phone and send it to me.”

“But I’m on the phone.”

“Momma, that don’t matter... Fine. I know ya have a scanner by the computer.”

“Oh dear, have I used that before?”

“Yes, Momma. All ya gotta do is,” Bro starts rattling off the directions to use the scanner as he remembers, fielding every question she has even though he doesn’t remember a purple button. And the scanner should have already been plugged in. And the screen she is describing is nothing like he remembers.

But eventually he gets to more familiar territory and she ends with, “Ah, there we go, you should be getting them soon.”

Seconds later his phone beeps and he pulls it away to check to make sure it’s the email, but when he looks, he sees the notification for a text instead. He opens that to find a couple photos taken with her phone attached to the text message.

“Momma.”

“I’ll see the two of you up here soon. Love you both. Give hugs to the twins as well.” Then she hangs up.

Bro just shakes his head. He enlarges the photos and sure enough their old names are on there with times and directions for a high school reunion. He only had one year of it but that was enough for him really. He’s lived vicariously through the twins for the rest. D had more of an experience with that particular high school and those three years didn’t end well.

But despite their tumultuous exit and prompt shift to homeschooling, they’ve done well for themselves. If the organizers for this got their information pulled in, probably from a yearbook or something, then there might be a chance that those who looked down on them before and during that last event might be there. There were only a handful of real friends that they left behind in New York. It would be fun to rub their success into their faces...

“What are you looking so contemplative over?” D asks, peering closely into Bro’s face. He looks freshly showered.

“Our monthly water bill ‘cause of the ocean you apparently had to bathe in.”

“Like you can talk. You and Dirk have your legendary, infinite showers. I know that wasn’t more than twenty minutes. Thought I heard you talking to someone.”

“Momma called.”

“Oh? How is she? How are the girls?”

“Good and good. Momma’s a bit of a troll.”

“Like usual. How’d she get you this time?”

“Sent me our invitations to a high school reunion at Derse by photo on the phone even though she claimed she couldn’t and had me walk her through the scanner, which is a piece of shit that I messed with a couple years ago.”

“Wait, wait, wait. Go back to that first part.”

“We’ve been invited to Derse’s high school reunion.”

“What? That... that’s just so wrong.”

“Kinda what I said. But they even got fancy with the invitations.” Bro turns the phone to show them to D who squints and scrunches up his face at the tiny image. “And the brats say I need glasses.”

“Shut up.” D flaps a hand at him. “Holy shit. How do you even fuck up that badly?”

“I know right? We should go.”

D looks up at Bro. “What?”

“Do we need to getcha a hearing aid too?”

“Fuck you. We’re not going.”

“Why not?”

“Because...”

“The shit that went down happened a long time ago. I doubt any of those fuckers will show up, even if they are still alive and haven’t been killed off by their own stupidity.”

“Still...” He rubs his own arms after a chill goes through him when he thinks about what happened in that locker room. It had been so close. He used to have dreams, nightmares really about what happened, but those have trailed off thankfully. Bro was always close when those happened to wake him up and comfort him. He’s only frozen once or twice with Dirk when his brother gets into that domineering mode and tells him to get on his knees for a blowjob, vaguely echoing the words said in the locker room. D’s worked through most of it and after a discussion with Dirk, he’s better at avoiding those scenarios. But it still haunts him slightly in the back of his mind.

“D, it’s alright. I’ll be there with ya.” Bro wraps his arms around D. “We can show those worthless mongrels that ya can’t keep the Lalonde brothers down. We got each other.”

They do have each other. And maybe it would be a good chance to put those monsters to bed. But still D feels hesitant.

“But what if they don’t like me, Bro? What if I’m not popular?”

Bro pulls back enough to level a cool stare at him. “You’re a freakin’ Hollywood director.”

“Oh yeah.” Yeah that argument wouldn’t have flown very far.

“But what if they’ve all turned into rich snobs?”

“I’m a pornstar, sex toy millionaire. Pretty sure we can out snob them.”

Well damn, there goes his other argument. D frowns only to keep himself from flapping his lips trying to come up with another excuse.

“I think we’re doin’ alright for ourselves, D.”

“But- but- I don’t want to go,” D says childishly.

“Where do you not want to go?” Of course the twins have to come back to the apartment in the middle of that conversation, at that part.

“We’ve been invited to a high school reunion.”

“But you guys didn’t graduate,” Dave points out with a frown before draping himself over the guardians still hugging, making them sway a bit to the side under his weight.

“I know, that’s what’s so perfectly ironic about it,” Bro counterpoints.

“Well obviously you have to go,” Dirk explains as he comes up to D’s other side and bumps against him. “For the ironies.”

“It’s not like the two of you got ugly or fat. Well, at least D didn’t.” Dave’s having to dance away from Bro’s swat with a big grin on his face.

“Maybe you guys could get laid or something,” Dirk offers.

“There was that pretty cheerleader...” D trails off in thought. “Wonder if she still got those hips.”

“Okay, good, he’s in. I forgot Veronica’s ass could get him to do anything,” Bro teases.

* * *

A month later they are on the plane heading to New York.

D is slumped down in his seat, ass almost off the edge as his feet are all the way up on the headrest of the seat in front of him. He is pretty focused on the phone in his hands which is resting on his chest.

“That can’t be comfortable. What are ya e’en doin’?”

“Looking people up. I haven’t thought about some of these fuckers in forever. Like did you know that Veronica became the head of the CDC? And Billy, you know the one who chewed bubble gum like a maniac? He became a fashion model for hiking boots.”

“Always thought he had nice legs. Just couldn’t stand the rest of him.”

“And Miranda beat cancer last year.”

“Oh shit.”

“While she started up her own company. A lot of these guys aren’t doing anything fantastic with their lives but damn, some of them have made wakes.”

“What ‘bout the assholes?” Bro asks tentatively.

“Alexander is in jail. Cristian is in jail again. Terry is out on parole. Gregorio is apparently in Europe doing who knows what, possibly dead. Murray is still living with his parents. Colin seems to still be around too,” D tells him with a frown.

“How are ya e’en gettin’ all this data? I can’t e’en ‘member anyone’s last name.”

“Hal. He’s doing a good job cross checking Derse’s files to what the internet brings up.”

“Kinda cheatin’ but decent.”

“Yeah... but that means three of them could show up.”

“And you’ll show ‘em up too. I’m sure we’ll be fine.”

“Hmph,” D grumps but doesn’t contradict Bro. They are adults now. They could handle anything those assholes could throw at them. In addition to the physical, Bro and D have made themselves into pretty big shots and are planning on dressing up for the occasion to show it.

D eventually straightens out his position by the end of the flight, mostly to get Bro to stop harping on him about his posture. They are quick to grab the luggage and their rental car (managing to convince Mom not to come pick them up for once). It’s pretty late by the time they get to the mansion but that just means that they see it from farther off as it’s the only light source in a twenty mile radius. It’s not too long before they are pulling up the driveway and watching the golden light spill out of the front doors as Mom opens it for the two of them, pulling each into a tight hug.

“Welcome home.”

“Hi, Momma.”

“Good to be home.”

* * *

They got to relax for a day and catch up with Mom and Roxy (Rose still being down at her college). D makes sure that Hal is keeping tabs on the twins, not that they still need a babysitter but with their hobbies, he likes to make sure that they aren’t bleeding out somewhere or burning the apartment down.

The day of the reunion, Mom helps them iron out the few wrinkles that came from travel as they dressed up in fitted, high designer suits that they picked up just to show off. D had ruby and gold cufflinks that matched the red of his shirt. Bro had carnelian gemstones set in silver but went with the classic white to go with his bow tie compared to D’s normal boring tie. They styled their hair until Roxy gave her approval.

When they were all put together they both cut very nice figures. The suits had been tailored to them specifically, fitting D’s narrow but tall frame and Bro’s wide shoulders but still coming in to give him a waist. Mom looks on with a warm smile and a heart full of pride. Roxy just obnoxiously wolf whistles at them until they drive away.

“We could still just go to McDonalds instead of the school, you know?”

“I just can’t believe they are holding something as big as a twentieth reunion in that dump of a gymnasium.” Bro waves the two invites. “Whoe’er did the plannin’ needs to rethink their life choices.”

“I think it was Sydney. Didn’t you sleep with her?”

“Uh yeah. An okay lay. I mean, I don’t have no problem with missionary, but spice it up a little on the third night!”

“Too much information, Bro.”

“Hey, I ‘member ya braggin’ about your exploits back way when.”

“And then I matured. Nice to see you haven’t.”

“Growin’ older is mandatory, growin’ up ain’t.”

“Obviously.”

D finds himself tapping the wheel of the rental car as he pulls into the school’s lot. He parks and turns the engine off. He’s nervous as fuck and trying to hold it back in. He’s not necessarily worried about the people in there. He’s more worried about the memories. He doesn’t particularly want to be triggered in front of everyone, especially with the over the top confidence they are supposed to be showing. He knows how to appear in front of crowds as he’s done hundreds of times as he walks down the red carpet. But what if he’s shaken by the ghosts of the past.

“Hey, you’re gonna be fine. Ain’t no one gonna getcha.”

“Not worried about them. Worried about me.”

“Oh.” Bro frowns and thinks on it for a second. Someone else drives up, parks and heads in quickly. A glance at the clock and Bro notices that they are a good thirty minutes late now. Stupid little sister. “D, you’ve faced down worse. Ya faced them down fine the first time ‘round. Ya ain’t gonna swoon and faint in front of e’eryone just because ya looked in the direction of the lockers. You’re gonna look and laugh. And we’ll be kings of the party.” Bro takes D’s hand and squeezes it. “And e’en if ya do, I’ll catch ya. I’ll drag your sorry ass back to the car and take a sharpie to your passed out face.”

“Oh, thanks,” he says sarcastically, but somehow that actually makes D feel better. “Thanks,” he says with a little more sincerity.

“Anytime. There will be dicks on your face.”

“I wouldn’t expect anything less.”

They climb out of the car at the same time. The slam of their car doors echoes emptily across the parking lot. There is just the ghost of music, supposedly coming from the gymnasium. Bro claps D’s shoulder and D smiles back at him before they school their features into perfect Strider masks. Just because they were invited as Lalondes doesn’t mean they have to be just Lalondes.

Together they walk to the familiar doors, down the familiar halls. Their path doesn’t takes them past the locker rooms, much to D’s relief. The terrible nineties music plays out of the speakers behind the double doors. The brothers pause right in front of them, look at each other, and then throw the doors open.

Of course the doors happen to be well oiled and balanced on their hinges so they slam into the walls making the nearest group of people jump and gasp (and there is one small squeak). Everyone looks over at the new comers who stride into the room like they own the place. They actually could if they wanted to, honestly.

“Jennifer, you look lovely! Haven’t seen you in years,” D breaks the silence  as he greets an old friend, “The triathlons have definitely been keeping you busy. And fit! I bet you could beat me in arm wrestling in a second. Probably less.”

“Richard? Oh, I mean D, isn’t it?” She places his name and face quickly.

“Honestly could go by either as long as you don’t call me Dick like this jackass did for years,” D playfully elbows Bro who just rolls his eyes at his brother.

“Oh my god, Derrick? You certainly grew up nice.”

“It’s nice to see ya too, Jennifer.”

“Oh that’s a gorgeous accent,” another woman chimes in. Bro tries to place the face but fails and has to glance briefly down at her name tag. Melissa ‘94. Okay maybe he never met her.

“Course it is. Been workin’ on it down in Houston.”

“Is that why we haven’t seen your infamous faces around New York?” D turns to meet the man who spoke.

“Yeah, Mike, we packed up and jumped to the south where our balls don’t freeze off. How’s it going for you?”

“Well Amy now owns my balls so let that speak for itself.”

“I can’t believe the two of you are still together. High school sweethearts, I’m amazed. I hear you took the business over from your father,” D asks with interest.

“Yeah, after he tried to run it into the ground.”

“But it’s getting close to being a Fortune 500 now. Amazing.” The rest of the groups starts whispering as their identity spreads out away from those closest. “I wouldn’t mind putting together a script about your story and throwing it at the Hollywood execs to see if someone bites at it. Here’s my card. We’ll get in touch so I can get more details from you.”

“Really?” Mike stares and blinks at D. “Amy! Did you hear that?” He runs off to find his wife.

Together Bro and D make the rounds through the group, congratulating their old friends and classmates on interesting life accomplishments. Bro mostly hung out in the back as D knows many more of the people here. It’s obviously not everyone who was invited but it happens to be a good mix of people from the classes that would have been in the year book.

Eventually however D gets engrossed into a conversation that leaves Bro looking around and he catches the attention of someone who looks very familiar. As she approaches Bro places the name so he smiles as the dame approaches.

“Derrick.”

“Veronica,” Bro returns, taking her hands and lifting it up to his lips in a chaste kiss.

“That’s not your usual leather jacket.”

“And that’s not your usual jean skirt. Ya look nice, sweetheart.”

“I always knew D would make something of himself, but you were always the wild card. A casanova that made all the ladies swoon.”

“Made? Have ya not looked ‘round. All ladies are still swoonin’.” Bro gestures the circle of women who have gathered around him.

“Alright, alright, you still make the ladies swoon.”

“Present company included?”

“When did you get so fresh?”

“I’m a sex toy mogul. I’m supposed to be fresh.” There is a small collective gasp from the crowd. “That’s right, ladies, I can make ya all happy at once.”

“Bro,” D’s chiding tone comes from next to him.

“Hey, it’s true. And it’s made me millions. Who d’ya think paid for your tuxedo?” Bro knows he’s laying it on thick but that’s why they came, isn’t it? To show themselves off?

“You did,” D plays along. “But who’s private jet did you ride to get up here?”

“Oh there ya go bein’ all fancy like,” Bro grins at him. They share the smile for a beat and then laugh as they turn back to their respective audiences. Food and drink flow with the conversation as they mingle. Bro and D purposefully ignore those that caused trouble way back when. Bro even noticed a rat like Murray scuttling out the back door at one point. That guy never had a backbone to start with.

Bro sees another of the group and he curses their luck that two out of the six have shown their faces. He swears under his breath as he sees Colin head towards D before Bro has a chance to warn him. It’s too hard to get through the crowds now that their fame and infamy have garnered. He does get to D’s side just as Colin speaks.

“What the hell are you two high school drop outs even doing here?” he sneers.

“Well, we were kinda invited.” Bro flashes the invitations. Colin snaps them out of Bro’s hands and inspects them as if they were counterfeits. “Seems like your wife isn’t the best at planning. Or maybe you helped out with the invitation list and just couldn’t resist seein’ our faces one last time.” D raises an eyebrow up at Bro. “Hey, I can do research too, ya know.”

“Fuck you too, Derrick.”

“Aw, not e’en usin’ my nickname. He helped with the invitation list for sure.”

“Right, I’d totally invite two drop outs to a high school reunion.”

“Us dropouts are making more money than you can dream of, Colin. What are you doing again with your life?”

“Uh...”

“That’s right. Guess that fancy private school diploma doesn’t go very far. Well, for you at least. Plenty of other people here have done so much more with their lives,” D indicated the people he was talking to before. “Yet you are still here, making everyone you meet miserable.”

Everyone can see Colin getting more and more worked up but nothing is said in his defense from the crowd and there isn’t much Colin can even say to defend himself.

“But you’re right, it’s a bit inappropriate for drop out to be here. So thank you so very much for the invitation, but we’re going to go have some fun on the town before we get back to our very rich and fulfilling lives down in Houston.”

D turns and starts to step away. Apparently that was as much as Colin could take and his arm lashes out for the back of D’s head. In the next moment, Colin finds himself face down on the ground with his arm wrenched back painfully.

“We’ve picked up a few tricks in our years. Haven’t been sittin’ ‘round on our asses earnin’ this money. Ya try to touch either of us ‘gain, especially in an attempted sneak attack, I’ll rip your arm off and beat ya to death with it,” Bro growls into his ear before letting go and stepping off. He catches up to D, quickly falling into pace and laughing with his brother like nothing happened.

Everyone else stares on in awe as the two Striders leave as grandly as they came. No one helps Colin up off the ground, his ill-fitting suit now dusty from the floor as he slinks off away from the party.

 

**Author's Note:**

> For more information please check out our work at striderclan.tumblr.com; we have more stories, head canons, art/pictures.


End file.
